


Meld-Merized

by Roughnight



Series: You. Me. Everything Else Is Irrelevant. [4]
Category: Dead Space, Mass Effect, Sherlock (TV), Star Trek
Genre: Asari - Freeform, Khan finds out about Sherlock, M/M, Mass murderer apprehended, Necromorph, Taking, The Citadel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-27
Updated: 2013-09-08
Packaged: 2017-12-24 20:52:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/944524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Roughnight/pseuds/Roughnight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>.</p><p>It was his face. The resemblance was so shockingly intimate and devoid of disparity that he started to disregard the impossibility and improbability of the unbidden thought that suddenly plagued his mind, that no matter how ludicrous and absurd it may sound, it could be the truth.<br/>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> .
> 
> Hi. Long time... sort of. This fic is still unbeta'd and it is entirely my fault. I am happy to say that there's a gracious soul who extended her hand for the beta-ing. So might improve the work later and make changes. ^^ but until then, and because I am suffering a terrible mood I cannot explain, I have to post this one to cure the Slump. 
> 
> .

 

~*~*~  

__‘I’m gonna see my man until I’m satisfied,”_ _

_-Me and the Devil_

_~*~*~_

 

_/“I don’t regret coming to you.”/_

_As if everything fell apart. Fell away. Irrelevant._

Khan wasn’t appeased, not at all. The displeasure was still there, just under his skin, simmering and swirling, like some sort of disease making him almost feverish and flushed.  His blood felt unusually warm—the way it would always feel when he was particularly feeling murderous or when he was actually committing an act of murder. He supposed he shouldn’t have been surprised that John Watson was able to hold his attention—it was bound to happen, the universe was vast enough that there was bound to be a number or two from some race with the ability to stir his interest; but that John Watson also seemed to have the knack of fanning the anger and frustration out of Khan at every opportunity presented without actually making the latter _hate_ him seemed to be a feat in itself. Somehow, along the way, during every turn that Khan would particularly feel murderous and wish to act upon it, John would manage to effortlessly and sneakily curve the malicious intent and inadvertently convince Khan out of killing him. He couldn’t decide if John was doing it on purpose or not. It was amongst the increasing pile of things which Khan cannot fathom. It was frustrating. Every piece of the puzzle was connected to each other and he could see the invisible strings that tie them up together, with John Watson himself and the man he mentions in his dream at the very center.

  

It didn’t escape Khan’s notice that John was able to promptly react to his assaults. He could’ve simply put it to the doctor’s Star Fleet training but there was always something that felt calm and personal— _almost intimate_ —with John’s counterattacks and while they weren’t calculated, they felt like responses, as if he was simply answering Khan’s calls. / _John Watson has come prepared even from my own violence./_  Khan felt exhilarated with the realization, a tiny moan escaping from his lips. It felt like an unadulterated rush of giddiness, sweeping the hot air from his lungs. Khan’s heart hammered frantically like that of a bird’s that his ribs hurt. The muscles of his limbs trembled in their excitement and the static of electricity crackled at his fingertips. He was drunk with joy invoked by John Watson’s existence and with the uncontainable hunger that now prompts him to devour the man. It was of the bases nature, carnal.

  

Khan has always been aware of his homicidal tendencies. His whole crew had it—it was inevitable with the superior genes they have, with the power and massive intellect they in turn possessed. They couldn’t be faulted from seeing the galaxy and the races in it differently from the others. But Khan’s penchant for blood was higher than most even among his crew. His crew has often described their urge for murder as boiling lava bubbling from the mouth of a volcano constantly. Khan has always thought that his was similar to that of a black hole—greedy and insatiable and totally uncontrollable.  He could feel it niggling at his skin now and coiling somewhere in his stomach. It was never _not_ there.

  

So it is established that Khan wasn’t appeased at all. If John Watson thought that he was successful at deflecting Khan from the seeking the answers to his questions and finding out the truth, then Khan would later remind him that he was wrong about it. John was a frustrating man but was admittedly not hateful by Khan’s standard. What were hateful are all the holes and gaps in Khan’s understanding of the situation surrounding John Watson and maybe John Watson himself.

  

_/“I don’t regret coming to you.”/_

And the emotions so tightly wrapped around the doctor’s motivations. John Watson angered and frustrated him but while all the others have ferried Khan into destruction and mass genocide, Khan simply felt unusually but powerfully aroused with him. Khan wanted to consume. He still wanted to kill—the need to break and destroy was overwhelming especially after his induced years of nap—but now the desire to indulge  on a man’s flesh was present, too. If he could be banal about it, he’d say that the need to rut was just as overwhelming. Khan _ached_. When John Watson pointed the stun gun at him back then at the shuttle, it took every ounce of his control not to throw himself at the other man—it was something he has never been good at, restraint.  He has still not figured out whether it was to beat the good doctor or fuck him out of his mind just to punish him for the cruelty of withholding important things from Khan and from being frustrating. Khan had a foot at each side.

  

The remaining travel it took for their shuttle to reach the Citadel was predictably not entirely comfortable.

 

~*~*~

 

For all the grandiosity the Citadel claimed to possess, its interior wasn’t really that remarkable or different from the other developed planets Khan had visited from his past. It almost didn’t hold a candle to the Earth he’s been exposed to three years ago. The Citadel was bland for his taste. Technologically developed infrastructures, superb communications systems, the well crafted illusion of safety and the capacity to generate its own energy to fuel the gigantic system—they were all advanced but not unusually so. They didn’t seem like such a great leap. If Khan had a spreadsheet predicting the degree of advancement the different races could achieve at a given time, he was certain that the Citadel would prove to be within the range, within the predicted and hypothesized end result based on solid evidences. What was perhaps the most peculiar in this place was the outer _design_ —the five massive limbs that stretched out from the center to form a pentagram. It had to have a purpose, had to have something that would prove to be interesting instead of the general dullness of its common interior—the place inhabited by organic beings. The outside structure was peculiar but the inside wasn’t interesting; but Khan supposed he still saw the appeal of the place—it was swarming with a multitude of races—their different individual hides all indicating the amount of technological superiority and tactical offensive abilities they have developed. The Citadel was the very center of galactic society. Khan filed it in his mind, that along with the Necromorphs, he had to get his hands with a sample from each species someday. He will have the right time for it… perhaps after he finished retrieving his crew and poking at the concept of time travel—these two dominated his black list.

 

They blended with the crowd, staying low key and avoiding unnecessary attention. John has changed into a hideous woolen shirt Khan has mistaken to be some kind of rug at first when he’d caught glimpsed of it and partnered it with a bland leather jacket. Khan himself has been provided with plain clothes and trousers of raven color. They now walked in the heart of the Citadel, taking advantage of the temporary solace they could have of the authorities’ ignorance of John Watson’s involvement in the tragedy that occurred in USG Ishimura or of Khan’s recovery out of his cryo sleep. Khan had his eyes fixed at the doctor’s back as the latter walked calmly and purposely. John’s strides were perfectly even without anything to give away the overflowing degree of caution and anxiety he was compelled to feel inside. The doctor was even keeping his face straight, not bothering to look down at the pavement and hide from the security cameras that were bound to be in place. A smug predator wearing a prey’s hide.

 

John led him towards a non descript residential building away from the main street—far from the center of activities. The unit they invaded was a small one, with a single bed tucked in the corner, a table and a chair opposite it, a small set of drawers and a door which presumably led to a bathroom. It lacked someone’s personal affects but Khan was certain that John lived here or stayed for some time enough for the faint traces of his smell to linger in the air. Without asking for permission, Khan rummaged the drawers, studying the meager possessions. They were all just as he predicted—the organization of the clothes and items were neat, precise, impersonal and boring—except maybe for the steel gun Khan knew was no longer produced or used at present—one that was carefully wrapped with a towel and hidden amongst the drawer of pants. Holding it in his hands, he whipped around and faced John who was silently leaning against the door and was watching him with intense blue eyes.

 

Khan recognized those deep eyes. It was a look Khan has been catching on John Watson lately. Sometimes, there was that look on John’s face as if he could not take his eyes away from Khan, as if it was impossible to look anywhere else. Sometimes, John would seem to be enveloped with indecision and he couldn’t bear to look at Khan. Most of the times, John seemed he couldn’t choose between the two—as if either of the two viscerally hurt.

 

“You have brought this with you,” Khan announced matter-of-factly while waving the gun with one hand, choosing to ignore the doctor’s lingering stare, “from your time, I mean, and this isn’t the only place you lived in during the past three years.”

 

“That’s a Sig Sauer you’re holding, and it’s a yes to both questions,” John answered with a shrug. “As soon as I’ve decided on what I had—or wanted to do, it became obvious that I needed several more places I could nest in.”

 

Khan simply tipped his head to acknowledge. He already knew that John Watson was prepared in so many ways, even to such an extent that Khan wouldn’t have expected of him. It didn’t change the fact that the room was distasteful, though. He hummed as he looked around the white washed walls. “This wasn’t what I expected.”

 

“What did you expect, then?”

 

“I don’t know,” Khan answered contemplatively, almost mockingly, as he favored a sideway glance at the doctor. “A blueprint of the Ishimura, a wall painted with diagrams, pictures indicating the vermins’ anatomy, a master plan of some kind… The release of the Necromorphs to secure my retrieval was _premeditated_ after all.”

 

John’s eyes hardened instantly as if he knew precisely what it was that Khan was doing and was prepared to handle it. He scowled but otherwise determinedly refused to be baited. _Shame_.

 

“I presume there’s significance in showing me the place you live in other than showing what a gun looked liked in your time?”

 

John rolled his eyes dramatically which wasn’t what Khan expected at all. “It’s to show you where you could run to and hide in any case we get separated or get chased, you berk! This place isn’t registered under my name.” There was exasperation in his voice but Khan thought he could also detect humor in it. John almost seemed as if he was biting the insides of his cheeks now. “It’s also to give as a breather so we could regroup and maybe have a few bites.”

 

Khan sniffed disdainfully. “I’d gamble your first and foremost reason for coming in this boring place was only so you could have those few bites. You’re _always_ hungry.”

 

John snorted as he detached his back from the door and started towards the bed.

 

“But then, I _am, too_.” Khan whispered suggestively, almost purring, when John passed by him. The doctor’s ears were just at the right level of his mouth. Khan knew when to take an opportunity when he sees it.

 

Khan reveled at the sharp intake of John’s breath. The wall practically echoed the sound.

 

~*~*~

_“I have plans.”_

John has explained to him why they needed to go to the Pub—it was to get in touch with his contact, acquire information and secure a ship to steal for their travel.  John has explained in bullets and in brief, simple enough terms while he munched on bread and beer, back at that hideous, cramped flat. What the doctor apparently failed to explain was the necessity of grinding hips with a blue skinned female of a different race and what it played in their plans.

 

They were in the Purgatory Bar, a night Pub that offered chances to inter mingle with different species. John had dropped Khan in a nearby booth after setting a couple of shots on the table before he decidedly, and casually, strode towards the center of the dance floor and _danced_. The doctor’s moves were slow, awkward and rough at first, half heartedly swaying to the beat of the music…that is, until a blue female draped in latex suit lumbered and pressed against John’s back so she could whisper against the doctor’s ears. It was then that John Watson started to truly dance. Khan would have found it hypnotic if not for the leech clinging on the doctor’s back.

 

The interloper was an Asari— _a ‘monogendered’_ race that could mate with any gender of any race because of their ability to meld minds and consequently read the genetic markings of any organic to design the gene codes for their offsprings. All offspring of an Asari naturally turn out to be an Asari as well regardless of the mate. Khan and his crew has encountered The Asari race in the Planet of Thessia eons ago and the only reason that the said monogenredered race did not suffer the genocide Khan and his mates generally inflict was because the Asaris were just as superior as them compared to the other organics. Asaris could live for centuries and they have biotic prowess inherent to their kind. Biotic powers that must be emphasized at this point Khan and his crew did not possess naturally.  The Asaris were the ones that came close to equals.

 

For a man who proclaimed himself doomed, for a man who thought himself already tumbling down to the Pit, John Watson sure knew how to groove and he did so rather effectively. John turned around and wrapped his arms around the Asari’s waist and _swayed_. The sounds and noises of chatters and the loud beating of the music faded to dull indistinguishable thrums to Khan’s ears. The doctor wasn’t helping Khan’s situation, then.  If Khan has been tethering over the edge of irrational animalistic desire, if Khan has previously been tipping over because of the violent arousal, then surely, he cannot be faulted if any semblance of control snapped. He just wanted to devour now, to hurt, and to strangle. John Watson is a dead man walking.

 

Khan did not see red, not that he expected to. It was something the humans used as an expression but Khan knew there was no chance he would experience such a thing. He had so much focus, the price of possessing a massive, superior mind. He found himself zoned in on the good doctor, his steel eyes trailing over the points of contacts between him and the female pest. John had his face tipped upwards so he could whisper something close to the Asari’s ears. The female lifted a hand to touch John’s neck before she bent down to press her lips back against John’s ears. Khan has already thought of ten ways to blow up the Pub without incarcerating himself and if that wasn’t enough, he thought about some practices he haven’t tried yet in blowing up Planets. He also wondered if he could invent a tenth Circle of Hell and introduce it to John.

 

It didn’t take long, John and the stranger’s hateful interlude. The doctor soon disentangled himself from the creature who would probably die later tonight and glided straight towards Khan’s booth.  He was visibly panting and sweating and his skin was pleasantly flushed.

 

“Hi,” John greeted meekly then he frowned when he saw that Khan’s goblets were not touched. Letting out a little sigh, he flopped down somewhere beside Khan and reached for a glass. Khan watched the man take in the blue liquid in long, needy drags, his adam’s apple swinging up and down.

 

“Are we done here?” he asked as soon as John dropped the glass back on the table.

 

Probably seeing the strained look on Khan’s face and the ugly scowl on his lips, John merely threw him a curious look and a raised brow. Khan did not have time to elaborate his situation.

 

“The information. The reason you rutted obscenely across the dance floor with the Asari proatitute,” Khan elaborated, his eyes piecing John’s, “have you acquired it? I presume you did not simply feel an itch and wasted time in this Pub? Surely you could have just left me in the flat.”

 

John’s mouth dropped. “ _Itch?_ ” He sputtered incredulously. “ _Obscene?_ ”

 

Khan groaned, gutturally. Frustrating.   “The question, John.” He demanded.

 

“I—yes, of course. We’re done here. We can now finalize the plan how to secure us a ship.” John answered hastily. He then scowled and licked his lips. “I didn’t know you know about the Asaris.”

 

“Irrelevant.”

 

“Is something wrong?”

 

Khan merely looked back at him and watched as a bead of sweat trickled at the side of the doctor’s face. Without a word, he got to his feet and started towards the exit. He heard John scramble behind and made to follow him.

 

Khan kept his strides quick, pulling the doctor along with his rapid pace. He knew what he wanted to do and if he could be frank about it, he’d say he waited long enough.  There was no need for courtesy for what he intended to do. It was best that John was oblivious about it and now would be a good time as any. He snarled and glared at the organics that stood on his way. Now that Khan decided to finally act, he couldn’t feel the anticipation and the brutal refusal that anything hinder him. Even without looking over his shoulder, he could feel John following suit behind. He was caught in cascading feeling of glee knowing that the man was only a step behind. It felt right. John Watson trailing behind him.

 

Khan abruptly whirled around and faced a startled John who almost collided with him. Without preamble, Khan snatched the doctor’s left wrist, powerful fingers wrapping snuggly around the pulse point and pulled.

 

If it felt right before, it now felt glorious. With John Watson trailing beside him, Khan’s hand wrapped securely on the doctor’s wrist.

 

 

 

 

.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> .
> 
> “And then I found out about you and I felt like opening Hell up just to get to you.”  
> .

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I send my love and my thanks to the wonderful **[Noxtorious](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Noxtorious/pseuds/Noxtorious)** who beta’d this chapter. Wow. Just wow. This organic is awesome. I can't be thankful enough. I am so grateful to her betaing skills.
> 
>  
> 
> Sherlock's pic in this chapter is courtesy of **[Nofavrell](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Nofavrell/pseuds/Nofavrell)**. Thanks soo much for your wonderful art. Love it! You're the best!

__

_“Hello, Satan,_

_I believe it is time to go;_

_Me and the devil,_

_Walking side by side,”_

_\--Me and the Devil_

 

~*~*~

 

The equation was simple. The presence of unexpended energy in every core, be it an organic or a synthetic, once it reached an exceeding capacity, would always short circuit the drive. For someone like Khan—a genetically engineered weapon of war— it was ultimately colossal. After all, most of it, if not all, resulted to mass genocides and planetary carnage. It was destructive, to put it simply, and the direction never inbound. It was to say that whenever someone like Khan would short circuit, he was the one least affected most of all. Even at the mercy of the overflowing and chaotic synapses, the control and the clarity of his brilliant mind would never drown. He did not and would never get lost among the crazy haywire unlike the  inferior humans, Vorchas, Batarians, Elcors and so many others to name.

 

Even now as he dragged the body of a rather startled Dr. John Watson inside the flat and pushed him against the door, pressing his thigh shamelessly against the shorter man’s groin, Khan did not really consider himself at lost for control. No. This was granting _consent_ to the desire. This was merely permitting a buildup of energy to find an outlet as it rightfully should, directing the flow of sparkling and burning synapses. He had finally accepted that he did not want the other dead—at least for now—and that he wanted to take it practically ached. His lungs convulsed and drove the air out of his body. Every fiber of his muscles engaged in a violent spasm.  His bones broke and melded. The sensation was no different from the way his heart thundered madly inside his chest that his ribs felt like breaking whenever the buzzing thrill of bloodlust took over his system. As Khan held Dr. John Watson by the neck and watched the man struggle in vain from the cruel hold, his soft face turning bloody red as the air failed to enter the constricted trachea, Khan thought how this man from the past was strikingly beautiful.

 

It was a shame that even with John Watson’s preparedness for Khan’s alleged violence, the doctor was still caught in the trap. _Good_. This better serve as a reminder for him in the future not to mess with someone of Khan’s caliber.  While John held mystery and intrigue and while he attracted Khan’s attention like a honey to a bee, Khan held pride in revealing that he was not one without cards up his sleeve. John struggled from Khan’s steady clutch on his neck but the latter held him pinned against the door by a thigh pressed against his groin and the left side of Khan against his chest. John heaved and wheezed violently and Khan took the leisure of watching the widening of pupils in those pretty blue eyes. Even in pain and clear helplessness against death, the doctor glared at him hatefully. The capillaries and veins are now so prettily engorged Khan rather thought he could trace them with the tip of his tongue. The taller man rewarded John by pressing their mouths together and then blew air into the doctor’s body.  Khan relished the feeling of the blonde man’s chest expanding against his own, responsively.

 

Being driven with lust. Drowning in a frenzy of statics. Getting high from the overwhelming exultation. **Taking**. **Ripping**. **Keeping**. If this wasn’t control, then Khan didn’t know what was.

 

John Watson choked and gurgled gracelessly against Khan’s mouth at first but as soon as he recognized the blow of air, the sliver of life, that Khan introduced, the doctor forced himself to still and sucked greedily what he could. The fingers that previously tore and clawed and hurt has now shifted into a desperate grip, an intimate hold. Khan smiled, reveling how his teeth and lips touched with the doctor’s. _Clever man_.

 

Khan knew many torture methods, knew the meticulous forms of punishments that could drive the brain of any man out of sanity within the frame an hour. He after all was acquainted with violence by default. His terrific genes ensured that. However, just because Khan did not find John Watson’s death acceptable meant that he was going for some other form of vengeance instead. It has dreadfully been a long time since he had taken for himself. Even the latest transgressions from his last awakening had been merely devoted to finding his crew. He discovered that he was immensely enjoying this. He was taking a profound amount of intoxicating delight in taking the stubborn, beautiful soldier he now literally held in his hands. There was something sweet and irresistible in finding delight for one’s self alone.

 

 _‘Did John understand this?’_ he thought as he flicked his tongue and brushed it against the roof of the doctor’s mouth, tasting an essence he found that he didn’t  know he craved.

 

John groaned against his ministration and Khan would have smugly smiled at that had not the other man clamped his teeth and bit the taller man’s offending tongue hard enough to draw blood. Khan released the doctor’s mouth and pulled back so he could look down at the fiery organic.

 

“ _What are you doing?_ ” John growled threateningly, his white teeth stained with the redness of Khan’s blood.

 

Exquisite. And for that, Khan answered him truthfully.

 

“Taking,” he confirmed before promptly driving back into the resisting cavern of the doctor’s mouth to nip, bite and suck. Tasting the coppery tang of blood, Khan briefly wondered if he had a tendency to commit cannibalism. Was it perhaps engineered genetically in him, too? Then he laughed against John’s mouth because surely, if he were to turn into a cannibal, he would live off the good doctor’s flesh. He changed his mind and decided to maneuver to a move designed to give pleasure. After all, he just made a joke.

 

A reluctant moan was elicited from the doctor’s mouth and he gripped a handful of Khan’s black shirt, nails digging at Khan’s flesh _. Stubborn, stubborn_. Khan’s blood sang in hearing the delicious noise come from the other man’s gorgeous mouth. John enjoyed the caress, his knees practically buckled and his body leaned more closely against the taller man. So it was a surprise when Khan heard the next words from the doctor.

 

“Stop it.” John hissed with a strained voice the soonest that he got the time to relinquish his mouth from Khan’s stranglehold, his lips brushing at the taller man’s jaw.

 

One word. One tone that blurred the lines between pleading and commanding.

 

One voice.

 

And Khan found himself stopping in the middle of a plan he was already executing, in the middle of his Taking. A low growl formed at his throat and he rebelliously leaned forward to prove wrong what he already knew but his arms already detached themselves from his body. His limbs disobeyed the command of his brain and did not breach the line of touching the other man yet again.

 

Stilling his ungratified and unappeased nerves, Khan leaned back so he could levelly look at the doctor’s eyes, not bothering to pull away from where their bodies connected. Khan’ sea blue eyes widened in gentle surprise and curiosity.

 

There was a look in the army doctor’s face that he did not recognize, could not for the life of him unravel but the simple rawness and painful curiosity of it captivated him, shockingly held him.

 

Khan found himself irresistibly drawn yet again.

 

While he did not care that the other man resisted his physical attention whereas many would’ve have gagged for it or would’ve been inexplicably honored that Khan even bothered with it, Khan found that it profoundly nipped at him. He found it unpleasant. He was annoyed. Yet while it grated his nerves, the look on John Watson’s face made up for it.

 

_Almost._

 

There was no trace of repulsion in the doctor’s face. There was not even a hint of fear. There was just pain and something that the super human, for the life of him, could not name. There was the subtle remembering of the past that almost cloaked the brightness of the doctor’s eyes—like a dark, glaze that hid what probably was the one thing Khan wanted to know about. 

 

Probably realizing that the taller man would no longer attempt any kind of attack—romanticized or not—at the moment, John let out a sigh he had not realized he held and rested the crown of his head against the back of the door. He let his eyes roam aimlessly at the ceiling tiredly before he closed them shut with a labored exhale. The doctor’s cheeks were flushed, the beautiful red extending up to the tips of his delicate ears.

 

Khan glanced down at the stretch of John Watson’s exposed throat and watched as a trickle of sweat lazily slid down the expanse of the taut skin. It was fascinating. It was a vulnerable spot. Khan found that he could spend the remainder of his time looking at it. It was then that he saw it—a silver chain laced around the base of the blonde man’s neck, dipping downwards at the center of his heaving chest from the weight of what it presumably carried.

 

Never one to tone down his impulses and never one to be someone who ignored intuitions, Khan reached out and swiftly plucked the chain off the doctor’s neck. He was not one to follow common courtesy and manners when they were dictated by lower creatures after all.

 

John yelped from the sharp sting of the chain snapping at the skin of his nape. He reflexively reached out a hand at the back of his neck and looked at Khan with murderous, reprimanding eyes. It was something really worthy of recognition, the doctor’s unrelenting defiance and bravery, his gall to lash out at khan without a second thought, without a trace of fear for his dear life.

 

John’s expression was quick to change, however, when he saw the chain resting in Khan’s hands. His blue eyes widened, almost frantic, almost bracing himself for something awful and unpreventable. He licked his lower lip and swallowed. A nervous gesture.

 

“Don’t.”

 

Which was of course, what Khan did. John looked pale. John Watson never looked pale in the presence of Khan even when the latter attacked and subdued him on numerous occasions.  The doctor was frozen on his spot like a candle buried in a bloody cake. Khan cast his eyes down at his own palms where the chain and what it carried lay. Instead of a locket, what was attached on the chain was a bullet casing in the color of silver. John Watson’s eyes were determinedly glued at it.

 

From the shallow, almost apneic, breathing of the doctor, Khan could already tell that it was something very dear to the man. It was something precious, something carefully and secretly treasured. The chain was almost rusty, unpolished, and yet while it was borne of steel and undoubtedly of the highest caliber, it was the bullet casing that was to be marveled. Clearly modified, personally designed and forged with patience, the mere shadow of it shouted ‘sentiment’. John Watson thought a great deal about it. It clearly was a tribute to someone or something. A memento. An offering. A world.

 

Khan’s gut twisted unpleasantly. He already knew that this tiny metal resting on his palm held some secrets he sought to discover. If John did not give them to him freely, then as he already made perfectly clear, he would take them.

 

He snapped the bullet casing open with his fingers, detaching the base from the rest of the body. Inside, as he predicted, was a rolled up piece of paper. He pulled it out and unrolled it to reveal a cut out picture of a man. The paper, too, seemed treated with chemical for preservation. A formaldehyde to something that was already dead. If this was another circumstance, if this was another time, then perhaps Khan would’ve taken the time to appreciate and marvel at John’s creativeness and his meticulous planning. As it was, Khan found that he only felt the cold fury wash over his twisting guts.

 

Khan should not have understood it. He was not a man inclined to pay and even reciprocate sentiments. But strangely, it cleared up the picture for him, gave answers to the many whys of the matter he would not ordinarily discover on his own. The psychology of the inferior organics was never one he paid attention to or cared about unless he was going to use them for manipulation and genius scheming. Nevertheless, he understood. With the superior genetics and sharp, brilliant mind that he has inside his skull, the pieces of the puzzles slotted together.

 

It was his face. The resemblance was so shockingly intimate and devoid of disparity that he started to disregard the impossibility and improbability of the unbidden thought that suddenly plagued his mind, that no matter how ludicrous and absurd it may sound, it could be the truth.

It was a picture of himself except that it was not him.

 

Something swelled. It swelled inside Khan like a star outdating its expiry and finally, finally, expanding ruthlessly and uncontrollably to engulf the planets in flames. Khan was not an entity for petty emotions and nothing involving the man was petty was a rule. As of the moment, though, Khan found himself gravely and legally insulted.

 

He laughed aloud bitterly, his own voice harsh and grating, abrasive even to his own ears. It was numbing. The sound enveloped the whole room, the low timbre of his voice echoing on the four walls. All other noises were non-existent. There were only the sound of John’s carefully controlled breathing and Khan’s manic laughter. The silence was so strained to the point that Khan rather thought he could break it with his hands.

 

John Watson was really a human that broke the odds that defied Khan’s spreadsheet on human behavior and their inferiority. With just a rub of his palm over his face, John’s demeanor dramatically changed. There was no sense of dread on the doctor’s face now: only an expression of resolve and grim determination. If someone ever doubted that this man was a soldier, they’d see it in John Watson’s eyes now.  He looked back at Khan calmly. Unashamedly. Unrepentantly. Determinedly. Acceptingly. And for the first time in Khan’s presence _, submitting_.

 

Not for the first time as well, Khan found himself wanting to tear the doctor’s gut out of his body.

 

Khan whipped his arm to slash at the air between them, the way he would have used a sword to dismember a necromorph’s limb.

 

“ **I. Am. Not. Him.** ” Khan snarled, reiterating each word ashe threw the chain and the bullet against the wall, near John’s face. The picture he kept squeezed between the palms of his hand. “If you came to me out of the ignorant, blind, and desperate hope that I am him—”

 

“Of course not!” John cried out passionately, his voice hoarse and strained. He almost sounded exasperated. He looked as if appalled to the direction of the argument that Khan was undertaking but was determined to sit it out patiently and painstakingly. His chest heaved profoundly as he took large guzzles of air. “I… I may have been desperate but I wasn’t a fool…”

 

“Could’ve fooled me,” Khan sneered, every word laced with cutting venom, his sea blue eyes stared down at the doctor with astounding cruelty.

 

With a suffering sigh and unrelenting determination, John Watson ignored him.

 

“But you’re brilliant and amazing and everything I have lost. Everything that was taken away from me, it felt like I fucking had them all back even when you’re quick to remind me with every breath I take that I don’t.”

 

John pulled at his hair in frustration. His legs buckled as if he wanted to pace around the room but quickly decided against it. That was a smart move on the soldier’s part. Had he exposed his back to Khan, the super human was sure to have sprung on him.

 

“I knew from the get go that you weren’t him. You cannot be him.”

 

Khan exhibited something he did not know he had in him. Patience. He wanted to hear John Watson out. He felt like a god sitting the whole affair out so he could pass on judgment at a later date and John seemed like a soldier awaiting his execution but still frantically wanting to scream his innocence even when he was already standing in the gallows. Perhaps it should not be that strange to him to have found out that he had patience. He was the man, after all, who spent his whole year pretending to be a slave to the Starfleet admiral just so he could build torpedoes and smuggle his whole crew into space.

 

“You love him.” Khan drawled coldly.

 

“He’s my best friend.” John answered evasively as if it was a question he had practice answering to.

 

Khan rather thought he had already spent so much time with secrets held from him. He’d been rather nice considering the things he did not do but would have done under normal circumstances. There was no more room for uncertainty. There was certainly no more room for the doctor’s dilly dallying.

 

“You love him.” Khan said more forcefully.

 

“I do.” John answered with tensed jaws and flushed ears.

 

“You’re in love with him.” Khan lashed out, wisely lacing his voice with disdain, provoking and challenging.

 

“I don’t know!” John snapped. Then quick as lightning, Khan was on him, tackling him and holding him in a vice grip against the wall yet again. The doctor grunted as Khan smashed the side of his face against the hard wood, Khan’s fingers entangled with the blonde locks to pull and push ruthlessly. John Watson did not plead nor did he retaliate against the result. By the time blood was smeared against the paint and Khan paused out of his whim, the ex army doctor was still glaring at him steadily—this time, without hate or malice, just raw and painful honesty.

 

“I don’t know.” John repeated, this time calmly. “I just don’t know…” he said almost resignedly. “It was taken away from me! Everything I had—it was all fucking taken away from me by this fucking time travel shit! You asked if I love my best friend—then **_yes_** , I do! If you ,meant in love, then **_probably_** —but every chance I could have had, before I could even figure out how I truly felt, it was all taken away from me so I just don’t bloody know!”

 

John closed his eyes, his teeth biting the insides of his cheeks. He breathing now sounded ragged. He must finally be hurting from the taller man’s attack. Khan did not ease his hold on the doctor. He was a predator steadily in pursuit of his prey.

 

“Finding out if he died from the Fall, it was taken away too! I may have just dreamed about the jump. It could have been just a mad illusion or a fucking nightmare. But this time travel crap just stole everything away..” Bright blue eyes now opened to stare determinedly at Khan. “And then I found out about you…” John’s voice sounded light and delighted. A dry chuckle came out from his mouth, humorless and manic, “and I felt like opening Hell up just to get to you.”

 

The ex army doctor sounded proud and elated with the last phrase. He looked irrational. There was a glint on his eyes as he flushed a mischievous grin at Khan. Then the clever, smarmy git was swinging his leg low on the floor and was engaging in a maneuver designed to subdue humans and probably other organics larger than him. Then Khan was losing his grip over him as he was tackled to the floor, the compact body of Dr. John Watson on top of him. He didn’t know how it was possible but the doctor has somehow managed to lock legs with the taller man.

 

It wasn’t really a fight, though, so Khan did not bother to counter the attack. He merely held his breath and masked a look of boredom as the doctor looked down on him.  John Watson was probably a smarter man than he normally let on, perhaps than he himself knows. There was an unfathomable depth within the bright blue eyes—as if there in the seemingly peaceful sea nestled a nebula. He looked tired, too, and the creases on his face were more noticeable. With a beat, he rolled off Khan and sat instead on the cold floor beside him, eyes now cast on the wall in front of him to avoid the taller man’s face.

 

“So how did I feel when I was setting up the release of the Necromorphs in the USG Ishimura? Because as you said, it was premeditated?  _Then I don’t know, too_. I didn’t even know how I felt most of the time back then. I couldn’t feel anything, numbed by this fun-fucking tragedy.”

 

_I don’t know._

 

It did not answer Khan’s questions. It shouldn’t have, but granted, it seemed as if it did. The revelation did not change anything in Khan. Frankly, it was just stupid. He still wanted to tear at the other man’s flesh, clothes too, he supposed. He laid still on the floor, the doctor crouching beside him, their breathing shallow and the silence just as sacred as the time earlier. Khan stretched out his arm above him and looked at the scrap of paper that held the image of John Watson’s best friend. Every minute detail was there. Unless they were of the same genetics and practically cloned, there remained just another possibility. What kind of obscure idea did Dr. John  Watson’s idea concocted in the face of all of the turmoil and confusion?

 

“Was he brilliant, this friend of yours?” Khan answered lightly, already knowing the answer.

 

“Very.” John replied solemnly. “He’s absolutely amazing.”

 

“Is that why you came to me, because we had the same face?”

 

“It’s because I heard of your tales and knew you were just as brilliant.”

 

Khan flicked his eyes to glance at the other man to find that the latter was already looking down at him. In those deep blue eyes that seemed as vast the galaxy, Khan only saw an irrefutable naked honesty and something else he just could not name at this point.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm kind of worried about this chapter... I get anxious as the story progresses--as more explanations about the whole affair surrounding John are revealed-- but I hope that this will all work in the end. Thank you so much for your inputs and comments. ^^


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